09/21/17: Hulu nabs exclusive SVOD rights to Will & Grace

Good morning. It’s Thursday September 21, 2017 and this is your your first early morning Digital briefing!

TODAY’S CODEBREAKER

Video Multiple Ad Playlist (VMAP): A video multiple ad playlist (VMAP) is an Interactive Advertising Bureau guideline. It standardizes a way for video content owners to define the timing and number of ad breaks, in addition to which kinds of content can appear in them. A video multiple ad playlist gives content owners a greater degree of control over their ads, even if they don’t control the video player itself.

JUST IN…

Will & Grace, meet Hulu. Starting today, all 194 episodes of the NBC sitcom are available to stream on the service. Under a new deal, Hulu will be the show’s exclusive SVOD partner. (The episodes will also be available via the NBC app, and through pay TV providers with authentication.) In addition to the original eight seasons, the Hulu pact extends to new episodes of the series, which is making a comeback on September 28. New episodes of Will & Grace will debut on those same digital platforms the day after broadcast. NBCUniversal is part-owner of Hulu, holding a 30% in the company.

Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal report that Google is nearing a deal to acquire part of HTC, the Taiwanese consumer electronics company. According to the Journal, it’s HTC’s phone-design business that Google is snatching up. The move reportedly comes as part of Google’s growing efforts to compete in the consumer handset market.

A CYNOPSIS MESSAGE

Sure, Millennials still matter but…

Gen Z is the largest, most diverse group of media users ever!

That’s why it is time to get familiar with this generation an understand their passion points, adapt your marketing strategy and start “clicking” with Gen Z.

Pinterest has introduced a self-serve platform for advertisers. The tool enables brands that use Promoted Pins to directly develop campaigns with members of Pin Collective, Pinterest’s creative network. Pinterest says that the process of developing a campaign using the new platform can take as little as ten to fourteen days. Previously, it could take as along as four to six weeks. Pinterest isn’t the first social media platform to roll out a self-serve ad tool; Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat have all done so as well.

PROGRAMMING

Sean Penn has signed on to star in The First, an upcoming sci-fi drama from Hulu. Taking place in the near future and centering on the first manned mission to Mars, the show hails from House of Cards creator Beau Willimon.

Crackle, Sony’s ad-supported VOD platform, announced its newest original film. Called In the Cloud, it centers on two tech geniuses who create a new technology designed to let them scan a terrorist’s memories using a virtual reality environment. Gabriel Byrne and Justin Chatwin will star. Other cast-members include Nora Arnezeder, Tomiwa Edun, and Laura Fraser. The film is now in production, and is slated to bow early next year.

Ghosted, the upcoming paranormal comedy from Fox, is hitting Twitter before it hits TV. From September 21-24, the show’s premiere episode will stream nightly on the social media platform, running at 9 PM ET. The series stars Craig Robinson and Adam Scott as paranormal investigators. It makes its linear debut October 1. This isn’t the only new streaming deal between Fox and Twitter: Twitter will also host a weekly pre-show for Empire. It’ll run each Wednesday at 7:30 PM ET, just ahead of the show’s 8 PM broadcast. In addition, Twitter recently hosted a marathon of the Fox comedy series The Mick, which returns to TV on September 26.

APPS + PLATFORMS

Amazon has been working on a set of smart glasses that would let users communicate with Alexa while wearing them, according to a new report from The Financial Times. The glasses would have to be wirelessly connected to a smartphone in order to work. So why does Amazon think it can succeed where Google Glass failed? For one thing, the new glasses will reportedly look like an ordinary set of spectacles, whereas many users found Google’s device aesthetically unappealing. Amazon hasn’t commented on the report.

RESEARCH

Netflix keeps a tight lid on its viewership data, leaving only third parties to offer their analysis. One of those third parties, the marketing-analytics firm Jumpshot, is out with a surprising new assertion: The Defenders, the much-hyped limited series that combines the protagonists of Netflix’s four existing Marvel shows, didn’t perform very well. According to Jumpshot, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, Daredevil and Iron Fist seem to be more popular on their own. The firm found that, in its first thirty days, The Defenders took in only 17% as much viewership as season 2 of Daredevil in 2016, which was found to be the top-viewed season (after thirty days) of any of Netflix’s Marvel shows. By comparison, Jumpshot found that Iron Fist, Luke Cage and Jessica Jones accounted for 28%, 27%, and 26% of Daredevil’s season two viewership, respectively. The data was first reported by Variety – you can read more about it here.

MEASURING UP

Tubular Top Ten Global Sponsored Videos Monday, September 11, 2017 – Sunday, September 17, 2017. Based on Tubular Video Ratings measuring 8 million video publishers, 3 billion videos, and 400 million viewers. Sponsored videos are ranked by V3, total views in the first three days after upload.

SHAREABLEE SOCIAL TV RATINGS: Top 10 U.S. Primetime and Streaming Shows for September 11 – September 17. Based on Shareablee’s Video Power Index (VPI), which combines viewing, consumer interactions and audience scale across all active platforms, and includes the video performance of primetime and streaming shows.

Source: Shareablee Inc. The total actions metric includes the total volume of post-level likes, shares, favorites, retweets and comments across social platforms.

The ListenFirst Television Interest (TVI) Rating (TM) is a standardized measurement of the most buzzed-about TV programs on linear TV and streaming services. A complement to ListenFirst’s other syndicated data products (such as the ListenFirst Digital Audience Rating – TV), the metrics included in the rating capture organic actions that are largely unaffected by paid media. Programs that surface on the TVI leaderboards are the most hashtagged on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and Tumblr, as well as most searched for on Wikipedia (used as a proxy for organic search volume).

All Series (9/11/17 – 9/17/17)

Streaming Series (9/11/17 – 9/17/17)

Source: ListenFirst. The TVI Rating aggregates metrics that measure organically generated activity by fans of the TV show. The metric includes total volume of official hashtag mentions on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and Tumblr, along with Wikipedia page views (as a proxy for organic search volume) for a show as a percentage of the total volume of the same activities for all shows.

– Aside from sports and specials, the programming that viewers were most excited about was the season premiere of South Park on Comedy Central.

– During VH1’s Hip Hop Honors: The 90’s Game Changes, people ooohed and ahhhed over Mariah Carey’s beauty.

– As you’d expect, the biggest number of congrats reactions occurred around the 69th Primetime Emmy Awards on CBS, with people giving kudos to Donald Glover in particular for snagging two wins: Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series and Outstanding Directing for a Comedy Series, both for his show Atlanta.

– An intense PPV fight between Canelo Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin had viewers serving up tons of crazy reactions.

– Canvs

EXECUTIVE MOVES

FuboTV has named a new exec. The company, which offers a sports-heavy OTT TV service, has named Yale Wang as VP,Head of North American Marketing. Wang previously served as VP and Head of Marketing for the Warner Bros.-owned DramaFever, an SVOD service focused on East-Asian (especially Korean) TV shows and movies. Wang certainly isn’t the first exec to join the company from DramaFever. Indeed, FuboTV was founded in 2014 by David Gandler, Sung Ho Choi, and Alberto Horihuela – all of them DramaFever alums.

Patrick Pichette, who served as Google’s CFO from 2008 to 2015, as been added to Twitter’s board. He replaces Pepsi CFOHugh Johnson. This is the second time a Google alum has joined the company’s board of directors: Omid Kordestani, who currently leads the board as Executive Chairman, served as Google’s Chief Business Officer before joining Twitter in 2015.

Cross MediaWorks, a consortium of advanced TV advertising companies, has named Paul Alfieri as CMO, a newly created position. He’ll oversee all strategic marketing, branding efforts, and messaging with the goal of advancing Cross MediaWorks’ product offerings. In addition, the group has named Madhusudhan Reddy as the new SVP and Head of Engineering for Cadent, one of Cross MediaWorks’ companies. Alfieri most recently served as SVP of Marketing for Turn, an ad tech company that was acquired by Amobee earlier this year. And Reddy is a veteran of Nielsen, where he’d held various engineering roles (most recent: VP of Global Engineering) since 2006.

TRIVIA

Season one, episode 2 of Hulu’s The Handmaid’s Tale prominently features a well-known board game. Which one? (Email trivia@cynopsis.com with your answer and be sure to include your name, company, city and state.)

Our Last Trivia Question: Malina Weissman, the young actress who plays Violet Baudelaire in Netflix’s A Series of Unfortunate Events, has also had a recurring role in which CW superhero series? Answer: Supergirl. Kudos to Andrew Bellamy-Producers Guild of America/NY, Andy Pittman-TAMU/TX, Dino Alexander-SpectrumOne.net/NC, Susan Nessanbaum-Goldberg-M and S Entertainment/CA, Stephanie Ann-Inside Lacrosse/MD, David Westberg-SAG-AFTRA Federal Credit Union/NY, and Tom Moore Kalt Productions CA

The Cynopsis Model D Awardsbrings together innovators and creators at the forefront of online video, elevating the industry with their contributions to branded content, technology, ad campaigns and original content. We’ll also be celebrating our honorees who will be named to the Cynopsis Digital “It List”, recognizing digital media’s movers and shakers.

Netflix just dropped the new trailer for The Punisher, the latest in its lineup of Marvel superhero shows. (On second thought, “superhero” may not be the right word for Frank Castle.) The series is slated to premiere later this year. Check out the trailer here.

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